There are voices that tell me
“This is not the way it should be”,
and “I am not the way I should be”,
or “you are not the way you should be.”

When I believe them,
everything is a struggle.

But when I stop to hear
that they are only so much noise,
devoid of meaning
unless I give them meaning,
then everything is easy,
and everything is okay.

At any particular moment,
there is most likely nothing
that really needs to be done.

What a relief,
to relax in that moment,
letting go
of the need to change it,
enjoying the peace
of giving up the struggle.

When we are open to them, life is full of reminders that we are not machines, that every situation gives us a choice of how we will or won’t respond. Therein lies our freedom!
​
Once again,
you have “pushed my button”
(or so my thoughts
would tell me).
​
And so,
I would feel compelled
to push back at you,
if my thoughts were true,
if that button were real.
​
But, as I stand aside
and watch this parade
of thoughts and feelings,
as if on the shore
of a roiling stream,
I may choose to only watch,
and not jump in.
​
Thank you,
my would-be adversary,
for this reminder,
that I have always had
this freedom,
to engage or not engage,
no matter what you do.

Wake up from the dream
of who you might become,
and open to the perfection
of what you are.

You are the universe,
and a single point in it,
expressing itself
at this particular time,
in this particular place.

A lawn of astroturf,
a lawn of grass and weeds;
what is the difference?

We have learned
to wrestle nature to the ground,
learned how to imitate it,
while slowly forgetting
how to live in it.

Our lives have always
been a part of it,
whether we have known it
or not.

As much as we include it
in our lives,
we are able to remember
what we’re made of.

As much as we exclude it,
we impoverish ourselves,
exiled to a prison
we built ourselves.

How do we meet another in neutrality,
so our natural love may flow freely?

How do we scrape away the film of illusion
that hides each person we meet
behind a wall of our own projections?

How do we see through our attractions and aversions
to reveal the fellow being that stands before us?

How long will it take
to see beyond these questions
to the truth behind them,
that all that separates us from each other
is the interference of our own thoughts?

When I stop to look around,
there is nothing wrong.

I am surrounded by a world
full of life and beauty.

And all my problems
are merely thoughts
of the future
or the past.

Try as you might,
I will not be your enemy.

Little by little,
I am coughing up
the poison pill
you pushed at us,
resisting the pull
to swallow and choke on it.

It’s bitterness
is almost sweet,
but not sweet enough
to hide its poison.

Addicted to its venom,
you have thrown your anguish at us
so we might drown in it,
as if to protect you
from drowning yourself.

I cannot relieve
your pain and anger;
I can only refrain
from giving in to it
and becoming a victim
myself.

Sometimes
a silent wisdom
speaks wordlessly to me,
and I find myself
doing what is needed
in that moment,
not knowing how or why
I came to do it.

These are the moments
when I trust in life,
feeling safe in its arms,
letting it take me
where it will.

There are two ways
to see our world:
as a sea of adversaries,
or a sea of collaborators.

And so, we have a choice
of what to swim in:
we are either all in this together,
or we drown ourselves
in an ocean of conflict.

Living with a cat
has taught me many life lessons.

One is that sometimes,
you have to shovel someone else’s shit
to make where you are
as clean as you would like it to be.